MichaelH

With about a half our of light to go yesterday on MD's early black powder opener, a buck comes into range. I initially was going to pass thinking it was a young deer until I saw the size of his body. He was just about broadside at 35yds when I took the shot, but the bullet went clean through a branch about 8 ft from me! It was so close, I never saw it through the scope or at least don't remember seeing it. I found blood, but I had no idea how far off the bullet strayed from the branch. As I'm slowly following the blood trail down into a swampy area, I hear him up on the other hillside about 30 yds away. He was down on all fours looking back at me. I held the flashlight up against the forearm and took the finishing shot. Turned out that the bullet ended in the front of the guts and from the look of the entry wound, it must have mushroomed a bit from the branch and didn't have enough left to exit. I was shotting 240gr XTPs w/ 100gr 777. One nice thing was that he actually died right on the trail making it that much easier to drag him back, which is a good thing since he is the biggest bodied deer I've ever shot. I wish I had a scale!
Live and learn with the branch thing. [sad]
Here's some pics.
Mike

jaybe

Well - congrats on getting that buck, MichaelH; so glad he didn't get away with a bad hit like that.
Yep - that's one of the (very few IMO) drawbacks with scopes - they focus right past intermediate objects. But I think the advantages FAR outweigh the disadvantages.
Again - Congratulations!

MichaelH

How right you are. I just started deer hunting with a scoped gun. The lesson learned is treat the shot as if I was shooting the deer with my bow. At least with a scope, you can better see any brush that's closer to the deer.

Mike

Jeff Ovington

Congratys on the buck..Sorryabout the mishap.....

MichaelH

Thanks. I guess the links I had didn't work, so here are the pics.

Alabama Slama

I was bowhunting this year and had a bit 160 class buck behind me when I shot it hit a limb that I didnt see adn sailed rite over its back.

buckmastr229

nice buck. the scope focus far out not close up thats why you did not see it

MN_Deerman

The exact same thing happened to me last year. It's the buck in my avatar. Blew off a 1" branch and ended up gut shot, found him 24 hours later in a swamp over a mile away.

tj_cubin

that happened to my father a couple eyars ago. he shot at a doe and after she ran he was standing there getting a perspective on where she was standing and where she ran... and he is trying to figure out jsut where she was standing... and it happened to be right in line with a branch with a hole in it. This branch had to be only a couple feet in front of the barrel. put a nice perfect hole through the branch but left the rest of the branch in tact. if you got close to it you could see straight through it to where she was standing. The branch got in the way of the shot, but at least it was a clean miss.

Icetrey

Now ,THATS,unlucky!Thats the trouble of shooting a scope,you cant see a branch.Thats why when I hunt where my stand has branches around it,with an open sight.Well at least you got the deer!Good Deer by the way